The grapes that pass the sorting process, crushed in a small, gentle crusher, then may be dropped directly into each tank. It required construction of a second floor through which peek the tops of the stainless-steel tanks in the room below. This hand-sort system is an expensive time- and labor-intensive process that is used by some producers of sparkling wine, but rarely by makers of red wine. Instead of being carried in huge gondolas and dumped into a giant crusher, the grapes will be delivered to the winery in 35-pound lug boxes, hoisted to the second floor of the winery and dumped in gingerly fashion onto a fruit-sorting table where workers will remove clusters deemed unworthy. For one thing, grapes will be handled more gently than in the past. Struggling vines, the theory says, make more complex wines.Īnother difference is that with their own facility, the Opus One winemakers can make wine with more finesse. Harrison says this means the vines will compete with each other. Opus One’s own acreage is densely planted in the Bordeaux fashion, with 2,200 vines per acre, about five times as many as in the usual California planting systems.
The remainder of the grapes are to be purchased from growers, as in earlier vintages. One reason is the 108 acres of vineyard planted in front of the winery, from which about half of Opus One will come. The wine also will be different from those of the past, in production if not in style. Only those with an advance appointment may visit. The result is a circular building that at its perimeter appears like a Roman amphitheater, rises in the center to an upper level with an almost turret-like cupola, and includes some striking geometrical patterns.īut most people will never see the Opus One winery it opened here to a most private public (invited guests), and the iron gate that faces Highway 29 will remain closed to casual visitors. Scott Johnson, of Johnson Fain & Pereira Associates of Los Angeles, did a balancing act between the California Mission-style favored by Mondavi and the chateau concept preferred by the Baroness Philippine de Rothschild, who succeeded her father upon his death in 1988. The striking facility cost $15 million, says project manager Stuart Harrison, but with all the equipment in place, the expenditure must have gone well over $20 million.Īrchitect R. Now, with a facility in which to make the wine and a vineyard of its own, Opus is no longer a wine looking for a home-it’s a real winery. However, the grace and complexity of Opus One have always made it drinkable when young, unlike many of the reserves, and it has turned out to have the staying power for cellaring too. The wine, always made at Mondavi by winemakers from both partners in the 50-50 project, was rarely as powerful as some “reserve” wines of other wineries. In the early years, because the wine was not tied to a specific vineyard site, the winemakers blended grapes from various regions to make a wine that hewed to an unwavering style. Recently a Bay Area wine shop hung out a joking sign that read, “Opus One, regularly $63, now $62.99.” Today, though, it’s selling all of its production (12,000 cases of the 1988) without much trouble, and you rarely find it discounted much below $58. A few years back it was moving so slowly it was sold to discount warehouses, which marketed it at $35.99. In the beginning Opus One did have to weather some market resistance. The market didn’t go for it, though, and a year later he meekly released his 1986 at $50. For example, after years of making headlines with his Stag’s Leap Cask 23 Cabernet Sauvignon, Warren Winiarksi put a $75 price tag on the 1985 vintage.
The high price made Opus One stand out, and it gained a cachet few California wines have ever been able to attain. At the time it was the most expensive California wine available (though it no longer is). It appears that the price, which at first seemed to have been put arbitrarily high, was a brilliant marketing move. The initial pricing of the first Opus One-at $50-was not shocking to those who realized that this price was partly set to gain attention.
Of course, with the prestigious names of Mondavi and Rothschild behind it, no one had seriously expected the wine would be cheap. If anything was ever criticized, it was the price.
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